Child Welfare and Welfare Reform Research
Kathleen Wells, Principal Investigator
Publications related to this research
My current research has focused on how the public child welfare system in Cuyahoga County has
functioned under conditions of welfare reform. The research is a collaborative project of CWRU's
Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences (MSASS) and the Cuyahoga County Department of Children and
Family Services (CCDCFS), the county's public child welfare agency. With funding from national and
local foundations including the Annie E. Casey, Cleveland Foundation, George Gund Foundation, and
the Ohio Department of Mental Health, this work began in 1998 and continues through the present
time. It is comprised of four inter-locking studies.
The first study is examining whether there have been increases in the Cuyahoga County child
welfare agency caseloads between 1995 and 2003, a period of time that encompasses the onset and
implementation of welfare reform in the county, and whether there have been increases in the
characteristics of caseloads indicative of economic impoverishment during that same period of time
(Wells & Guo, 2000).
The second study focuses on one part of the child welfare caseload that has increased
considerably since 1995, children in foster care. This second study is examining whether children
whose biological mothers lost income from welfare, after children's placements, returned home more
slowly than did children whose biological mothers did not lose such income (Wells & Guo, in
press; Wells & Guo, 2002). This question is being examined for three cohorts of children-one
pre- and two post-welfare reform groups. Currently, we are preparing to analyze data for foster
children in the second post-welfare reform group. The second cohort studies are based on pilot work
study published in 1999 (Wells & Guo, 1999).
The third study examines a number of competing hypotheses as to why we found the relationships
we did in study two for the first two groups that have been studied. One important finding from
study two is that mothers who received cash assistance consistently had children return home at a
faster rate than did children whose mothers received but lost a significant amount of this
assistance after their children's placements. Hypotheses turn on the adequacy of mothers' resources
in relation to their needs.
1 The third study is based on intensive, in-home interviews with a subset of biological
mothers of children in study two. Analyses of interview data are underway.
The fourth study describes the implementation of welfare policy in Cuyahoga County during the
period under study. This study is based on interviews with key county policymakers, specifically,
the directors of agencies responsible for implementation of welfare reform in the county in 2000
and 2001. Analysis of interview data will occur this fall. These findings will help place the
results from the other studies in an appropriate context.
1With funds from the Ohio Department of Mental Health, we are also studying the
psychiatric symptoms and use of mental health and other services by this sample.
PUBLICATIONS
All publications can be obtained by emailing K. Wells:
kmw3@case.edu. For more information regarding K. Wells, please
see
her Web site.
Articles Published in Journals
Wells, K., & Guo, S. (in press). Welfare reform and child welfare outcomes: A
multi-cohort study.
Children and Youth Services Review.
Wells, K., & Shafran, R. (2005). Obstacles to employment among mothers with
children in foster care.
Child Welfare, 84(1), 67-96.
Wells, K., & Guo, S. (2004). Reunification of foster children before
and after welfare reform.
Social Service Review, 78 (1), 1-22.
[Winner of the 2005 Pro Humanitate Literary Award- Herbert A. Raskin Child Welfare Article
Award, Center for Child Welfare Policy of the North American Resource Center for Child
Welfare].
Guo, S., &
Wells, K. (2003). Research on timing of foster care outcomes: One methodological
problem and approaches to its solution.
Social Service Review, 77 (11), 1-24.
Wells, K. , & Guo, S. (2003). Mothers' welfare and work income and
reunification with children in foster care.
Children and Youth Services Review, 25 (3), 203-224.
Conference Proceedings/Monographs
Wells, K., Guo, S., Shafran, R., & Pearlmutter, S. (2004).
The impact of welfare reform on child welfare in Cuyahoga County, Ohio project . Final
Report submitted to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Cleveland Foundation, and the Gund
Foundation. Cleveland, OH: Case Western Reserve University, Mandel School of Applied Social
Sciences.
Wells, K. & Shafran, R. (2002).
Mental health needs of biological mothers of children in foster care. Final Report
submitted to the Office of Program Evaluation and Research, Ohio Department of Mental
Health. Cleveland, OH: Case Western Reserve University, Mandel School of Applied Social
Sciences.
Selected Papers Presented at Professional Meetings
Wells, K. (2005, February).
Mothers under siege: Reflections on research, policy, and practice with mothers with children in
foster care. Invited presentation at the Schubert Center for Child Development, Case
Conversations on Children in Research and Policy, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland,
Ohio.
Wells, K., & Shafran, R. (2003, November).
Mental health needs of biological mothers of children in foster care. Invited presentation
at the Ohio Department of Mental Health Research Results Briefing 2003, Columbus, Ohio.
Wells, K., & Shafran, R. (2003, September).
Barriers to employment among biological mothers of children in foster care. Invited
presentation at the annual meeting of the Public Children Services Association of Ohio, Columbus,
OH.
Wells, K. (2003, August).
Reunification of foster children before and after welfare reform. Invited presentation at
the Community Partnership Meeting, Cleveland, OH.
Wells, K., Guo, S., Shafran, R., & Pearlmutter, S. (2003, March).
Deterioration of child welfare families under conditions of welfare reform. Invited
presentation presented at the Joint Center for Poverty Research Conference, Child welfare services
research and its policy implications, Washington, DC.
Wells, K., & Shafran, R. (2003, January).
Mothers' low incomes delays reunification with their children in foster care. Paper
presented at the meeting of the Seventh Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Work and Research,
Washington, DC.
Wells, K., & Guo, S. (2002, January).
The impact of welfare reform on child welfare: A comparison of one pre- and one post-welfare
reform cohort of children in foster care. Paper presented at the Sixth Annual Conference of the
Society for Social Work and Research, San Diego, CA.
Wells, K., & Guo, S. (2001, November). The impact of welfare reform on foster care and child
welfare in Cuyahoga County, Ohio. In K. Shook (Chair),
Assessing the relationship between welfare and child protection using micro data. Panel
conducted at the meeting of the Association for Public Policy, Analysis, and Management,
Washington, DC.
Wells, K., Guo, S., McCafferty, J. (2001, June).
The impact of welfare reform on child welfare: Implications for research, practice, and
policy. Paper presented at the meeting of the Child Welfare League of America Conference on
Research in Child Welfare, Denver, CO.
Wells, K., & Guo, S. (2000, August).
The impact of welfare reform on foster care and child welfare: A case study. Paper presented
at the meeting of the National Association for Welfare Research and Statistics Conference,
Scottsdale, AR.
Wells, K., & Guo, S. (2000, January).
Analysis of grouped event data: Methodological problems and strategies for social welfare
research. Paper presented at the meeting of the Society for Social Work and Research,
Charleston, SC.
Wells, K., & Guo, S. (2000, January).
Impact of welfare reform on the child welfare system. Paper presented at the meeting of the
Society for Social Work and Research, Charleston, SC.
Wells, K., Guo, S., & Sloan, J. (1999, August).
Impact of welfare reform on child welfare in Cuyahoga County, OH. Paper presented at the
meeting of the National Association for Welfare Research and Statistics Conference, Cleveland,
OH.
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